The Road Twice Traveled
by Neftzer
Summary: COMPLETE. Missing moments from S2 "A Good Day to Die" and the Season One finale two-parter, as Allan A Dale is confronted with going ahead in the choices he's made, or turning back. Set at the Portsmouth Road Inn and the barn in Nettlestone. From a yuku prompt wanting a fic about why Will and Allan came back to the gang after having decided to run off to Scarborough in S1.
1. Chapter 1

**Title:** The Road Twice Traveled  
**Writing Prompt:** Yuku Gift Exchange 2011/12 Ficathon; Request # 9 - _A missing scene set in/between S1 ep 12 and 13: what happened between Allan and Will on the road to Scarborough? Why did they return to Robin and the gang?_  
**Word Count:** 4935  
**Rating:** PG (Adult Themes)  
**Characters/Pairings:** Allan-A-Dale, Will Scarlet, mentions of other series outlaws, villains, and their ladies.  
**Spoilers/Warnings:** Through Season Two ("_A Good Day to Die_").  
**Summary:** The Portsmouth/Nettlestone/Scarborough connection. On Robin Hood's birthday, Allan-A-Dale experiences an intersection of time and a crossroads of decision.  
**Disclaimer:** The BBC's _Robin Hood_ is property BBC/Tiger Aspect.  
**Category:** Drama/Angst; Short Fic ; Happiness through Allan-centric Fic

**The Road Twice Traveled**

_Betrayal._ To wit: Could a man - a person - betray the Sheriff of Nottingham? Betray Sir Guy of the elusively located 'Gisborne'? Could such a thing be done when the very notion of betrayal seemed to rest, most importantly, upon the concept of a shared trust and the one-sided breaking, or dissolution, of that very trust?

Did these men...blackguards, scoundrels, and as-near-to-daemons-as-one-should-ever-wish-to-come share such a trust with anyone in the known world? Even, with each other? It boggled the mind to even suggest such an above-board liaison existing between the two.

**"Betray** - more at traitor. **1:** to lead astray; esp: SEDUCE **2:** to deliver to an enemy by treachery **3:** to fail or desert, esp. in time of need **4c:** to disclose in violation of confidence"

Allan-A-Dale had not the particular, bookish curiosity that could have at one time lead him to such manuscripts housed within Nottingham Castle and all they might have had to offer in ponderance upon such a subject - much less defining it. But his own conscience knew better than most that he was, at present - through his actions over the past year - ticking off the multiple definitions of the very word with each traitorous breath he took.

Tick. _To disclose in violation of confidence:_ how many of Robin's plans and secret ways of eluding capture had he shared with the enemy?

Tick. _To deliver to an enemy by treachery:_ one loyal-to-the-King Roger of Stoke, deceased.

And now, _to fail or desert, esp. in time of need:_ Would he add this to his mounting list of shortcomings maturing into sins? He had failed already, deserted through his choosing an (in hindsight flawed) course of action - but now, _now_ 'in time of need' would he stay that course? Would he - through bull-headedness, through a weird, little-understood desire to shoulder responsibility for his actions - attempt to sleep in the bed he had made for himself?

Surely his own, over-worked guardian angel held her very breath waiting to learn what choice he might next make.

* * *

**Portsmouth Road Inn -** A sweat had first sprung up upon his lip as he castigated himself over his inability to stay angry for long. It was simply not a skill he possessed. Flashes, really, lightning-brief moments of anger were all he had ever been able to hold against Robin (against anyone). And certainly those flashes were more easily expressed than the bone-deep fear of abandonment and, yes, _betrayal_, he had expected to receive upon the King's return.

And though Robin was a combat-learned Crusader, no doubt their tussle in the castle kitchens would have at least shown himself having more of an edge had he been able to harness a long-lasting rage or fury - rather than the simple desperation he had felt.

Perhaps lack of sustainable anger had brought him to where he was. Certainly Will would never have been able to work - much less function - under the Sheriff and Gisborne (he had failed at it already in Locksley). His temper and outrage would have seen him executed in the first hour. John, too - though he operated on more of a slow burn. Even the usually non-violent indignation that defined Much would have compromised old Muchy's ability to carry on, follow orders, and look the other way, all the while submerging what negative emotions chores for such men usually entailed.

Certainly, Allan-A-Dale had been deeply angry several times a week (if not more) at things he was tasked to do while he wore the Gisborne black. More than once found himself teetering upon the precipice of furious. But it never lasted. The next day he was ordered to do something else, the weight of coin in his purse the only permanent reminder of his deeds.

* * *

It was a rainless night. In the barroom below a few hangers-on still sang out of tune, occasionally calling for another October Ale. But their noises lessened considerably with each passing quarter hour. He found himself fiddling with his dagger, a gift from Robin on the very night he had agreed to spy for Gisborne in return for escaping certain torture. He did not think he could ever part from it - the lone thing he still wore daily that reminded him of the past, of the forest. Of friendship and camaraderie and better, cleaner-feeling times.

In all likelihood it was not a gift of much significance to Robin – chief among the outlaws had simply noted its good blade, withdrew it from a chest of the day's haul, and encouraged Allan to take it for his own. But it was that action - no doubt unthinking - by Robin, bestowing a thing of value on a man shortly resolved to betray him that Allan saw in it more often than not. At times it made him feel as he thought he knew he ought: low-down, dirty, hollow rubbish.

_Just_ as he had been at razzing the gang (and on Robin in particular) for never paying or rewarding him, _just _as he had covenanted with the devil's lieutenant Gisborne in exchange for release and future payment - here was the moment Robin, in the twinkling of an eye, reached out to him: rubies in the hilt of its finely-tooled golden blade, forged with consummate craftsman's skill. More than once Allan had unintentionally nicked himself with it when at paring his nails.

And here he was, that same Allan-A-Dale, untrustworthy (certainly the other lads would say so), disloyal, undeserving - contemplating betraying the Sheriff and Gisborne, and asking himself: was he ready to die? To die as had Lambert, as had his _own_ brother - and countless others?

It seemed clear to him - clearer than any other decision (all of which he had usually fallen arse-backward into) in his life - that by morning he would have to decide: certain physical death were he to ride out, away from here, back to Nottinghamshire and do what he could for the gang (for whatever of the gang might be left alive); or, stay the course he had been following of late and endure the rottening away of his insides, and an eventual emotional death.

Choosing a direction, a path with such finality was not entirely foreign to him. After all, there was a point-of-no-return in cards. Many a seasoned grifter would find himself musing upon it over a warm pint of an evening when the take had been good and the ears in the tavern willing to listen. A point when you went all-in, and waited only to see the hand's conclusion, unable to take further action.

Emotional death. He almost smirked. For if sustaining anger was _not_ a gift he possessed, holding on to enduring regret certainly seemed to be.

His mother used to say, on occasion, (usually when she knew the table was likely to be bare - or mostly bare) that if she could but make a meal of her regrets and sorrows she'd never again pass a day hungry.

And if Robin were yet alive (after all, Locksley's Lord'd pulled more magical escapes out of his bag of tricks than any man had a right to), perhaps the imminent death of Allan-A-Dale would come at _his_ hand. Which was yet another reason he, said Allan-A-Dale, would have to further weigh the feasibility of taking Marian away with him as well.

On a good day - on a day his own regrets (using his mother's recipe) would have made only a scanty snack - he liked to compare himself to her, to Lady Marian. Likewise a spy in the castle, working with the enemy, but not so as that lot were ever able to accomplish much. Watching out - even if his help was not wanted - for Robin's best interest.

_He'd managed to stay alive, hadn't he? And to keep the gang alive and whole (without him), hadn't he?_ He'd done Marian more than a few favors.

_After all, Marian was Robin, really, wasn't she? And Robin, Marian?_ Two sides of the same coin. A promise from one honored by the other. One able to still the killing hand of the other.

In his agitation his own hand had gone to his never-far-from-him coin purse. He withdrew a coin, the marking upon it visible, and tactile as well. He let his thumb roll over it. Oh, he and this mark were old acquaintances - if not friends - by now.

_To lead astray; esp: SEDUCE:_ see also one Will Scarlet, skin of wine in hand, following him down the forest road to Scarborough.

And so Allan-A-Dale recalled himself standing at yet another crossroads; leafy and green - wet with rain, unlike the dry, hot, close air of the second floor sleeping room he currently occupied.

* * *

**Road to Scarborough -** He looked back at Will, bringing up the rear. The rain had lightened somewhat.

He had not cared for Will's response to his question, 'Know wot I'm thinkin'?' It showed a decided lack of insight-apparently chronically so, as Will claimed he never did, never had.

It was not a response that bode well for their future together. _Partners_, Allan had told himself as the idea of an escape and relocation to Scarborough had coalesced in his head. He and Will would be partners in a return to the old life. Certainly he could think of no one he would trust more than Will. No one better suited to become his first apprentice in grifting.

Once they were free of the Sheriff's grip, out of the shire - and then some - anything would be possible for them. The King, after all, would not be able to right the many wrongs of the world overnight. Sure, Robin's re-instatement would no doubt be instant - first order of business and all that. But the rest: potential pardons for those the Sheriff had wrongly convicted and imprisoned? That would take time. Installing Much at his promised Bonchurch? Probably involved paperwork and ceremonies, the sending of invitations, the planning for a feast. Nothing to be done in haste, and all that.

The heart of the thing, though, really: 'wrongly convicted'. '_Wrongly_ accused'. But he knew it too well. He had not been driven into a life of outlawry by the Sheriff's injustice. He had chosen the wrong side of the law long ago, and for far from political reasons. Chosen in favor of himself - not nobly in favor of others, as Robin had done. And it was the King's Own laws he had broken - no matter that the Sheriff was the man enforcing them. Allan-A-Dale might not have deserved the dangle for his transgressions - but he could not with clear conscience argue that he didn't deserve _something_.

Him and Will? He assured himself they'd never have to return, never have to worry about being recognized. Auntie Annie would give them a roof over their head and three square a day. The horse he led was saddled with just the means to bring such a profitable abscond about.

He caught the scent of some herb or other, wet and fragrant along the wooded road as they walked away from Nottingham and Sherwood, and an image of Djaq leapt into his mind. Not only an outlaw, she wore the skin of the King's sworn enemies. Allan chewed on his lip only a moment before willing the perplexity that was Djaq to wash over and away from him. It was not like she could have been induced to come along - no more than could have John. Their belief and faith in Robin was total. There was no (he was certain) shaking that.

But, his two-steps-ahead mind scolded at them across the distance, Robin was not head man now. Now, he would give over to the King. It would be the King's will and rule. A King that might not entirely think the Sheriff's way of doing business was quite so off the mark.

He stopped himself. _Wait_. If he really believed the King might not be wholly trustworthy - might not prove the savior Robin prophesied him as - what was he doing running out on his best mates? Leaving Djaq to face a man - a powerful monarch - who would doubtless consider her an enemy? Leaving Robin and Much to quite possibly have their unrealistic, rosy dreams of happily-ever-after-England dashed before they might find themselves in the stocks?

_What was he doing?_

Scarborough was a long way off to expect to hear news of men in Sherwood Forest - much less from which to enact a rescue (before it was far too late).

He grabbed for several wet, hanging leaves from the branches above, and scrubbed them on his face, trying to wipe away his doubts, trying to make the road ahead - the road to Scarborough - easier, less cluttered, to see.

**...TBC...**


	2. Chapter 2

**Nettlestone Barn -** His father had helped raise this barn, the largest in Nettlestone Village. Will Scarlet could recall the celebration quite clearly, though he had been only the smallest of lads at the time - Lukey not yet even born. He recalled his mother. Her Locksley-colored headscarf standing out among so many others of distinctive Nettlestone dye. Of course there were women and men here and there wearing cloth of Clun and Knighton. Merchants from Nottingham, and as far away as Barnsdale Village. Even, several who had traveled on foot from distant Wadlowe to enjoy the opening of the new mill, and the raising of this barn to partner it.

It was to be an auspicious enterprise, one that would benefit all the shire.

He looked about himself now. Wondered: had Much been there? Robin, surely, would have attended. Marian's father, the old sheriff, had overseen the work. And John - he would have been old enough, had he been so inclined, to participate in the construction.

Present for its creation, thought Will, attendant, now, upon its imminent destruction. It seemed wrong to him that something inanimate would define his own lifespan. The barn, of course, had been built to outlast them all. But even it - even his father's painstaking and in-its-way artful work could not withstand Ellingham's army of mercenaries, like as not to make a meal of the carefully selected weight-bearing beams as to set them ablaze.

Earlier he had found his way to the far corner he recalled, located the marking carved into the timber that proved his father's claim on this structure. As he rubbed his own wood-loving hands across the mark - not quite a letter, not quite a picture - he thought of Luke, of what remained of his family, up (he hoped) in Scarborough - away from all this. Hoped, in a way, that tales of his impending death would never reach his younger brother.

He thought of his father, a man who spent his life building, creating. The utter opposite of the Sheriff, who liked nothing better than to see things torn down, destroyed.

But most of all he found himself thinking of Allan. Even before Djaq's proposed game of whatever-it-was that he couldn't pronounce. Allan-A-Dale, a larger ghost here, within the night's coming-on dark, than even the barn's architect. How much had Allan helped in bringing the gang to this failed juncture? How much (if at all) had he attempted to scupper it?

Maybe he was dead already, the Sheriff (a man of no great trust where others were concerned) having begun his outlaw elimination plan with the turncoat.

Maybe said turncoat had informed Gisborne that it was nearing Robin's birthday, and to be on the lookout for suspicious behavior. And in this way was responsible for the impasse they'd encountered.

Will looked over to Djaq and caught himself thinking of Marian. What would she do, once they were all dead? Would she find herself even more tightly under the Sheriff's thumb? Would she recover from the loss of Robin?

His father's face flashed before his eyes first, and then, unexpectedly, Allan's.

_No, one did not recover from such things_.

One did whatever one could to avoid such loss - whether it be to death or to circumstances - _before_ it was too late.

_But_, something in his brain asked, _barring the finality of death - was it ever, truly, too late?_

* * *

**Road to Scarborough -** Will Scarlet told himself to keep his face forward. Not to look back. Though moving at a far faster pace, he imagined, this would have been the passage his father, Lukey, and Benedict Giddons would have taken to Scarborough after escaping with their lives (and only just barely). Doubtless, it was the path his father had expected him to follow them on. Only, at a time not _quite_ so distant from their own departure.

Up ahead he saw Allan grab for some leaves and use them for a quick bathe of his face. Odd, that. Hadn't the rain (only now lessening) soaked them well enough? Despite his hood his own chin and nose still dripped with it.

"Where'd this horse come from?" he called up ahead, his curiosity getting the better of him.

"Nicked him, 'course."

Of course. _Silly to ask_. "'d ya leave anything for 'im?"

"Nah! No reason to – t'wasn't anyone about."

Will's voice bottomed out. "So you stole him."

Allan shrugged and gave a slight harrumph, clearly not liking what he saw as prying questions.

It would take more than an harrumph to put Will off. "And for our provisions -" he challenged Allan, "once we part with the forest, will we steal, or buy those?"

"Well, _steal_, naturally," impatience grew with Allan's every response. "If you must put it so plainly. 'Twill be good practice for you."

"No," Will disagreed, not addressing how stealing might prove 'good practice'. "We've monies and gold enough now," and here he announced a new rule by which to live. "We buy them, properly."

At the ultimatum, Allan sighed heavily, and dug into one of the horse's saddlebags. Waving some of the coin about he announced, "_Marked_ coin, see?"

"All of them?" Will took issue. "Mayn't we pick them out? Discard those marked?"

Allan stuck his head closer into the bag, trying to keep time with the obediently walking horse, and staying mindful of his own toes where the hooves were concerned.

"'S all marked - even the bowls and such, bearing the brand of the House of Gisborne."

Will saw the answer quite clearly. "We will have to stop, then, allowing time for melting some of it down."

"Buggered if I will," Allan protested. "Stopping and laying about's the surest way to end up caught or dead. Not to mention outside of a forge you'll not likely get the heat up to a proper level to do such a job right."

"But as they are marked, if we use them to pay for anything..." Will's brow creased.

"Sooner or later it gets back to Gisborne, and he finds the person we paid," Allan laid out the chain of likely events, "And then he finds _us_."

"Nice of you," Will sneered, "showing such concern for the welfare of the poor peasant we've implicated in our escape."

"And how am I not concerned about said peasant?" Allan asked, his voice rising slightly. "I said - we don't use the gold. We nick as needed. Once in Scarborough, we can find a way to melt it down, and then start making real use of it."

"So we steal, in order to keep the innocent populace from finding prices on their heads, and Sir Guy of Gisborne at their door?"

"Sounds about right," said Allan in agreement, choosing to ignore the sarcasm dripping from Will's summation of the next few weeks of their lives on the run. "Look," he suggested. "I think the rain's gone and made us cross. Best, perhaps, if we just have a bit o' silence for awhile, agreed?"

Will shot him a glower. The idea of having to lie and steal his way toward a free future did not sit well with him. It hardly smacked of "Robin Hood". And how would it be if they were caught at such capers as those to which Allan was clearly accustomed? Robin Hood's men, brought back to Nottingham in chains, the countryside - the whole shire - knowing that with the return of the King, the man in whose name they claimed to fight oppression, they had not only run from His justice (however He saw to mete it out), they had taken up living as common bandits, abandoning their code, besmirching everything they had once claimed to hold dear.

He made eye contact with Allan, tried to stare these thoughts into the other man's head - wondering if Allan could ever tell what _he_ was thinking, and feeling in the moment how convenient such telepathy would right now be.

* * *

Their gaze held strong for several moments, before Allan turned to see why the horse had stopped, unbidden, in his tracks.

The thing planted in the middle of the road was small, black enough to be taken for a mere shadow. Looking into its eyes, Will Scarlet found he could easily enough decipher what _it_ was thinking.

* * *

Allan-A-Dale's first thought was to call the wee beast's bluff - even with its tail raised in threat, the two white strips traveling down either side of it - it hardly crested over a foot tall.

Of all days, of all moments. This was not the right one.

He stepped the horse to the side. The skunk repositioned itself.

He tried the other side. The skunk again compensated, its tail making it very clear it had no intention of letting anyone pass.

Allan allowed himself a quick glance over his shoulder at Will, whose reaction to the animal was easily twice as wary as his own.

"Do you know the story," Allan asked, keeping his voice conversational and non-threatening, "the one where the bloke's donkey speaks to him? Won't let him travel one step further on the road because the Lord's deemed his plans too wicked?"

"What?" Will asked, unable to see what Allan's obscure knowledge of the plots of various mystery plays had to do with their current predicament. "I already told you, Allan, I _don't_ think like you."

"What I'm saying," said Allan, "is we're going back." He indicated for the horse to retreat. "Now get on, and let's get away from here as quick as can be." He threw himself up into the saddle, hoping the motion would not startle the skunk, and offered his hand and forearm to help Will up behind him. "Agreed?" he asked.

"Know what _I'm_ thinking?" Will asked, from his place behind.

Allan swiveled his head 'round and took a moment to consider his traveling partner's eyes. "Yes," he consented, "yes," with a level of exasperation at the smug 'told you so', that he understood there. "Just don't, you know, go to the trouble of saying it out loud."

Behind them, still lord of that patch of Sherwood Forest's road north, the skunk reflected a moment, re-tucked his tail, waddled about in a circle, and lay himself down for a nap, his domain secure, his authority unchallenged.

**...TBC...**


	3. Chapter 3

**Nettlestone Barn -** Will Scarlet caught himself before placing what was on his mind into an actual prayer. Censored his untamed thought and returned it to its box. He had nearly framed the request, start to finish. '_Please_,' he had almost thought, '_a second chance for Allan - for peace between us all again_.'

Good that he had stopped it. Right. Best not to make holy appeals for something you're not even sure you want.

* * *

**Portsmouth Road Inn -** Nottingham Castle under the Sheriff's rule knew more than a little of rich foods, fresh produce and generous servings of delicacies like beef - things of which the peasantry saw little. Such could not be said for the inn along the Portsmouth Road. At least, not for the stew available in the tavern below.

The Sheriff had taken himself off to his rooms quickly enough, ordering a posh (or as posh as such an inn might create) tray to be sent up to him, along with the prettiest wench or serving lad, depending on whatever suited his present taste. Gisborne had placed his heavy stomp of boot down the stairs and to the inn's hall and engaged for himself a small, private dining closet off the main barroom. When Allan had tried to follow him there, he had been shooed away. The very scowl upon Gisborne's brow seemed to say, 'stew for you'.

So it was small wonder Allan's belly was at war within him now in the wee smalls.

He felt a pounding in his heart, not dissimilar from the one he experienced when he was about to make a bad decision, despite knowing he oughtn't. It was a built-up sort of sensation, one that perhaps he needed to physically propel himself in such moments. Sweet Delly Vickers, but he'd be an idiot not to realize that if he ran, and if the gang - any one of them - yet lived, that he'd be compelled to immediately race back in pursuit of the Sheriff and Gisborne - the very two men his own instinct would counsel him to avoid...indefinitely. One simply did not return from Egypt while Herod yet ruled. Not if a bloke was smart, and yet with a will to live.

He did not agree to allow his planning-prone psyche to map out what he might do were he to find he'd arrived in Nettlestone too late.

* * *

**Footpath to barn at Portsmouth Road Inn -** Thing was, it was _Will_ who was good with locks.

It was him whose nimble fingers were good at filching keys - whose canny mind was best for bribing or distracting guards - whose quick lips were adept at chatting up housemaids to find where the key might be hidden.

But Lady Marian had no guards set upon her, so total was the Sheriff's faith in the irons with which he'd seen her shackled. The serving wenches would know nothing of the key's whereabouts.

He was never very appreciative of the Gisborne leathers, but this night, in this moment, he felt almost thankful for them. They lent to his concealment as he crossed from the inn to its neighbouring stable.

It was not an ideal situation from which to affect an escape. Inns were places where travelers could arrive at nearly any time, where lodgers could awaken and demand service at any time. There was no way he was the only other person afoot at this hour. Stealth and speed would be all.

Hopefully, without his outlining such obvious needs step by step, Marian would understand this.

"I can't find the key," he told her as he stepped into the barn and she startled awake from where she had been drowsing against the stone wall. Oddly, by the time it reached his ears he heard it sound more of 'I can't kill the King.'

She did not waste time to congratulate - nor to scold - him for his last minute change of heart.

Someone - the innkeeper - burst in, just as Allan got himself out of sight. After the man had again left, he stepped out from one of the stalls with what his limited horse sense told him would prove the fastest mount.

"How shall we get you free, then?" he asked Marian for assistance in her own rescue.

"Without the key, I do not think it likely," she confessed. "Besides, you have the only good horse among the lot. The Sheriff's matched pair is better used for pulling weighty loads than for their speed. Even if I were free to go with you, two on a mount would nearly double your traveling time." Her voice grew more determined. "It is speed that matters now. Speed, and when you arrive, the quickest thinking. With that horse, you've the speed - and your own mind will serve for the rest."

He had finished the job of saddling, and grabbed for the reins. He cocked an eyebrow, his tone half-teasing. "Shall I tell Robin, then, how you were only looking out for _his_ life, _his_ best interest?"

He thought he caught a dash of light reflected across her teeth as she smiled at him.

"You may tell him I have his best interests at heart. Long ago I learned that in protecting him, I best protected myself." She looked at him as though she very much hoped it was something he, too, would come to understand.

Allan leapt to the next thing. "He will come for you, of course - if he lets me live long enough to tell him what's happened."

With whispered intensity Marian assured him, "They don't want to kill you, Allan. Well, perhaps John does. And Much wants to see you punished - but they don't want you dead. They want you back."

His tone was light, even in the saying aloud of their worst fears. "And if I arrive to find the worst?"

Her head snapped to attention from where it had momentarily bowed at his bleak suggestion. The blaze in her eyes told him all he needed to know: it would be another horse for him, then, and a second hell-for-leather flight down the Portsmouth Road not unlike the one he was about to take.

He nodded his head as a sort of farewell/good luck to her, thinking that it seemed doubling back was nearly set to become a signature move for him.

If only he could expect the same half-a-chance in battle, the same disapproving (but still welcoming) welcome from his mates - his still living, breathing mates - when he dismounted in Nettlestone as he had once met with in Sherwood.

On a day just after a cleansing rain, when the Sheriff and Gisborne were on the rout - when even the lowest moment had been turned on its head. A day when the given-up-for dead had lived again.

That was all he needed - another day like that.

He wondered if Will would say that was too much of a miracle to hope for.

Very well, he would ask him when he got there.

**_...the end..._**

* * *

**A/N:** This was originally posted anonymously on the yuku Robin Hood BBC board. (These notes taken from my post there): I didn't really go to any lengths to disguise myself, here, I mean I picked a prompt w/ Allan at its heart, gave him the dagger from both _Sisterhood_'s opener and my own '_Death Would Be Simpler to Deal With_' fic; I had him fingering some marked coin given him by Gisborne (as shows up in my '_The Ties that Bind...etc_'). And the passing concern of what might happen if the gang is dead, and Allan the only one left alive to rescue Marian (as in my '_There, But for You, Go I_'). I just heart continuity too much. Oh, and I worked Nettlestone (clearly, my hometown) into it.

It was someone else watching with me that I asked (originally) why Allan went and ran at the news of the King returning. I admit I could not really figure out why, because in my mind as a viewer there was never any question that Robin would see to everyone, at the expense of his own life if need be. Never a moment's doubt. But when I asked, the person watching with just sang out, 'because he's afraid'-and it was like this whole door opened for me into Allan's character at that moment. Fear, actually – ultimately - brings Allan to enact the very thing on Robin & Co. that he fears will happen to him: betrayal.

You may enjoy "_There But For You, Go I_", which is the story that follows this one in my (Robin Hood) ficverse. It's the story of Allan once he's in Portsmouth and the gang's looking for Marian. It is posted here.


End file.
